Scott was thirty-one years old and had worked at Weldonville since he was twenty-six. The job of commander’s deputy was not at all what he had thought it would be. He had worked for a while in a state facility, where crimes were ugly—murder and armed robbery, child abuse, assault. He had always assumed that a federal prison would have a lot of men who were easier to be around. He’d expected the people in federal prisons had committed federal crimes, like counterfeiting, stock and bond manipulation, or postal fraud. He couldn’t recall having seen any of those offenders at Weldonville. They were all hard cases now.

He used the logic of elimination to decide how to attack tonight’s problem. It would do no good to look in Cellblock C for the seven men, because whatever had happened there was over. Order had been restored, or had returned on its own because everybody was locked up. The same was true of the infirmary. The patients on camera were all in their beds. The yard was empty and the towers that oversaw it were manned. The best remaining idea was that maybe the squad had taken the two offenders to the solitary holding cells away from the cellblocks so they could be interviewed separately and the arguments sorted out before they were either disciplined or returned to the general population. When he reached the first stairway, he opened it with his key card and began to climb.

He took a route along the catwalk above Main Street. He told himself that it was a shortcut, but the prison was a place of straight lines and right angles, so whatever route ran the length of the place was the same distance to the inch. The truth was that the catwalks were above the cellblocks and the prisoners and the routes they could use. If he met anyone up here, it would be one of the roving guards armed with rifles, and that thought was comforting.

He trotted along the catwalk, trying to make good time. Captain Humphry was a fair boss, but he felt it was his job to evaluate everyone. It was essential for Scott to dispel any suspicion that he was lazy, incompetent, or fearful, a man trying to keep his place in an office so he wouldn’t face the danger the guards had to.

He didn’t like being out alone this way in the prison, especially when there was an odd breakdown in the surveillance and communication systems. He was determined that after this lonely scouting mission, Humphry would be pleased. At least for the present, Humphry would approve of him.